United States History and Geography: Making a New Nation
Development of the nation prior to 1850
- The names and locations of the major military battles, campaigns and turning points of the Revolutionary War, the roles of the American and British leaders and the Indian leaders' alliances on both sides.
- Describe the contributions of france and other nations and of individuals to the outcome of the Revolution (Benjamin Franklin's negotiations with the French, the French navy, the Treaty of Paris, The Netherlands, Russia, the Marquis Marie Joseph de Lafayette, Tadeusz Kosiuszko, Baron Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben)
- The different roles women played during the Revolution (Abigail Adams, Martha Washington, Molly Pitcher, Phillis Wheatley, Mercy Otis Warren)
- The personal impact and economic hardship of the war on families, problems of financing the war, wartime inflation and laws against hoarding goods and materials and profiteering
- How state constitutions that were established after 1776 embodied the ideals of the American Revolution and helped serve as models for the U.S. Constitution
- The significance of land policies developed under the Continental Congress (sale of western lands, the Northwest Ordinance of 1787) and those policies' impact on Indian land
- How the ideals set forth in the Declaraion of Independence changed the way people viewed slavery
5.7 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE U.S. CONSTITUTION AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE
- The shortcomings of the Articles of Confederation as set forth by their critics
- The significance of the new Constitution of 1787, including the struggles over its ratification and the reasons for the addition of the Bill of Rights
- The fundamental principles of American constitutional democracy, including how the government derives its power from the people and the primacy of individual liberty
- How the Constitution is designed to secure our liberty by both empowering and limiting central government and a comparison of the powers granted to citizens, Congress, the president and the Supreme Court to those reserved for the states
- The meaning of the American creed that calls on citizens to safeguard the liberty of individual Americans within a unified nation, to respect the rule of law and to preserve the Constitution
- The songs that express American ideals (America the Beautiful, The Star Spangled Banner)
5.8 THE COLONIZATION, IMMIGRATION AND SETTLEMENT PATTERNS FROM 1789 TO THE MID 1800S, INCLUDING THE ROLE OF ECONOMIC INCENTIVES, PHYSICAL AND POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY AND TRANSPORTATION
- The waves of immigrants from Europe between 1789 and 1850 and their modes of transportation into the Phio and Mississippi Valleys and through the Cumberland Gap (overland wagons, canals, flatboats, steamboats)
- The states and territories that existed in 1850 and their lcations and major geographical features (mountain ranges, principal rivers dominant plant regious)
- The explorations of the trans-Mississippi West following the Louisiana Purchase (Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, Zebulon Pike, John Fremont)
- The experiences of settlers on the overland trails to the West (location of the routes; purpose of the journeys; the influence of the terrain, viers, vegetation and climate; life in the territories at the end of these trails)
- The continued migration of Mexican settlers into Mexican territories of the West and Southwest
- How and when California, Texas, Oregon and other western lands became part of the U.S., including the significance of the Texas War for Independence and the Mexican-American War
5.9 THE LOCATION OF THE 50 STATES AND THE NAMES OF THEIR CAPITALS